The worst violence in the past two years against minorities
in Serbia occurred between March 17 and 20, 2004. It was sparked by the violent
rioting by ethnic Albanians throughout Kosovo on March 17 and 18.40 In Nis and Belgrade, demonstrators set the city mosques on fire. Mobs in Novi Sad, the
capital of Vojvodina, damaged the premises of the Islamic center and damaged
bakeries and pastry-shops owned by ethnic Albanians and Muslims. Angry crowds
in Novi Sad attempted to break into settlements inhabited by Roma and Ashkali
(Albanian-speaking Roma) families. In other towns in Vojvodina and elsewhere in
Serbia, smaller groups of people damaged bakeries and pastry-shops belonging
to ethnic Albanians.

Nis, March 17, 2004: Islam Aga Mosque

On the evening of March 17, 2004, a group of two thousand
demonstrators gathered in the central square in Nis, the second largest city in
Serbia. Around 10 p.m., demonstrators marched toward the nearby Islam Aga
mosque and set it on fire, chanting Kill, kill Shiptar!41 When police arrived the
mosque was already burning. Police allowed the crowd to block fire fighters
access to the mosque, leaving them unable to extinguish the fire.42 The fire
destroyed most of the mosque and its tower (minaret).43

The municipal prosecutor in Nis indicted eleven individuals
for participating in a group which inflicted damage on the mosque in the amount
of 5 million dinars (equivalent of US$90,000).44 But the indictment failed to consider the
attack as an attempt to incite religious hatred within the meaning of article
134 of the Basic Penal Code. The indictment treated the mosque simply as
property rather than taking into account its symbolic nature.45 Since damaging property
and causing arson through common violent activity are prohibited under article
230 of the Serbian Penal Code (participation in a group that commits violent
acts), the prosecutor relied on this provision in bringing charges against the
alleged perpetrators.

Nis district public prosecutor told Human Rights Watch that
her office was in a dilemma as to the legal nature of the crime, and that the
decision not to use article 134 may have been a mistake.46 She insisted, however,
that the decision was not related to any political considerations. The
anticipated difficulty in proving that the perpetrators of the mosque burning
acted with intent to incite religious or ethnic hatred was the decisive factor
in the prosecutors decision to use article 230 instead. According to the
prosecutor,

It is true that we could have started the case as one of
incitement to hatred, because we would always have a possibility to amend the
indictment during the trial, if we assessed that we were not making progress in
proving perpetrators intent to incite. We could, in that case, change the
indictment into one of participation in a violent group, which is a crime easier
to prove. But, upon examining the investigation files, we concluded that the
evidence was not sufficient to prove the intent to incite, and we could not
expect anything new to appear during the trial to change that. So we decided
that we should from the start treat the case as one of participation in a
violent group.47

The reasoning on the part of the prosecutor appears
misplaced. The critical element a prosecutor needs to prove in an Article 134
case  the intent to provoke ethnic or religious hatred or advertent
recklessness that such hatred would result  is obvious from the highly
symbolic nature of the mosque as the target and from the slogan Kill, kill
Shiptar! the demonstrators in Nis chanted during the attack.48 Moreover, the prosecutor
also appears erroneously to consider that article 134 requires specific intent
to incite hatred when advertent recklessness is sufficient.

The way the district court in Nis dealt with the case
suggests a bias in the administration of justice. The court sentenced eight
defendants on July 26, 2005, to prison sentences ranging from three to five
months for their roles in the mosque burning. In the oral explanation of the
decision, the presiding judge did not make any reference to the grievances and
interests of the Muslim community against whom the crime was directed. The
court only considered the interests and sentiments of the Serb community,
including those of the accused. While ignoring their nationalistic bigotry as a
potential aggravating circumstance in the determination of the sentences, the
court emphasized the partly justified revolt of the accused as an element
purportedly mitigating their responsibility. The presiding judge also remarked
that the conduct of the accused damaged the interests of Kosovo Serbs rather
than helped them, implying that the gravity of the crime would be lesser if the
mosque burning had positive consequences for Kosovo Serbs.49

Belgrade, March 18, 2004: Bajrakli Mosque

Just after midnight on March 18, a group of several hundred demonstrators
set fire to Belgrades only mosque.50
Before reaching the Bajrakli mosque, the demonstrators broke through an
undermanned and ill-equipped police cordon, injuring two dozen policemen.51 The police
were initially prohibited from using force, at the request of the Interior
Minister Dragan Josic. The authorization to use force arrived only after the
police cordon crumbled, at around 20 minutes past midnight.52 Around 1.30
a.m., when the whole mosque was already in flame, a unit of the Serbian special
police (gendarmerie) arrived at the scene and dispersed the mob.53 Around 1:40
a.m., firefighters arrived and extinguished the fire.54 In contrast to the
mosque in Nis, which was built mainly of wood, the solid concrete construction
of the Belgrade mosque saved it from complete destruction. Most of the mosques
interior was destroyed by the fire however, together with the adjacent building
of the Islamic Community in Serbia  including 14,000 books, objects of art,
computers, and other items.55

The failure of Serbian authorities to respond promptly and
properly to the arson attack on the mosque is underlined by the fact that, a
year and a half after the incident, only one person has been tried in
connection with the fire and one has been indicted.56 The two prosecutions
look particularly inadequate when one considers the large number of individuals
involved in the attempt to burn down the mosque. Police arrested seventy-eight
demonstrators in the early hours of March 18. Criminal charges were filed
against thirty-six of the seventy-eight people in connection with the
disturbances in Belgrade on the night of March 17 and the morning of March 18,
including a number of those who had allegedly participated in the arson attack
on the mosque.57

None of the criminal charges brought by the police involved
incitement to ethnic or racial hatred. Prosecutorial authorities also have
refrained from indicting the accused for that crime, although the demonstrators
in Belgrade, like those in Nis, expressly invited hatred against the targeted
community by chanting Kill, kill Shiptars! before and during the attack58 and by
painting these same words on the minaret.59

In the only two cases so far in which criminal prosecutions
have been instituted, the accused were charged with participating in a group
that commits violent acts (Article 230 of the Serbian Penal Code). In the only
case that has reached the trial stage, the First Municipal Court in Belgrade sentenced Stefan Gajic, age 20 on April 11, 2005, to a three-month prison sentence
for participating in a group which damaged the Belgrade mosque.60

In addition to the two persons charged with the attack on
the mosque, as of July 2005, around fifteen other persons were under
investigation for attacks against the police, rather than for participation in
the burning of the mosque. In those cases, the ongoing investigation concerns
the crime of preventing an official in performance of the duty to maintain
safety, public order and peace (Article 24 on the Public Order and Peace Act).61

Novi Sad

On the night of March 17, as well as in the following two
days, ultra-nationalistic mobs in Novi Sad violently attacked bakeries and
pastry-shops owned by ethnic Albanians and other Muslims. According to the
police, thirteen bakeries and four shops were damaged in the riots.

A mob damaged two bakeries under the name Evropa, owned by
an ethnic Albanian. The larger of the two is located on the main street (OslobodjenjaBoulevard) and was a predictable target. Only a few days earlier, the
police had protected the same bakery when ultra-nationalistic soccer fans were
returning from an important match at the nearby stadium.62 When the riots began on
the night of March 17, two policemen had initially guarded the bakery, but left
when the bakery closed. The demonstrators then came and broke the window and
damaged the interior.63

At around 1:45 a.m. the following morning, demonstrators set
fire to the pastry/meat-pie shop Aziz, on Futoska Street. The shop is located
near the main intersection in the center of Novi Sad. The owner of the shop is
Gorani by ethnicity.64
He told Human Rights Watch:

We lived across the street, so we could see that there
were police there, but they were just watching. The next morning we tried to
clean up the wreckage, but the students from the electrical-engineering school
from across the street cursed at us, Shiptars, get out of here! So we had to
leave. Around 4 p.m., the demonstrators entered the shop and destroyed
everything that may have been preserved from the previous night. Nobody from
the authorities has visited us after the destruction of the shop. I do not know
who wiped out the shop, and I dont know if anybody has been tried.65

Also on the night of March 17 or in the early hours of March
18, demonstrators damaged the bakery Vojvodina, on Vrsacka Street. The mob
had previously damaged the building of the Islamic center, several hundreds
meters closer to the center of Novi Sad. When the demonstrators made a turn
from the main road (Futoski road) to Vrsacka Street, the owner of the bakery
heard a policeman asking over his walkie-talkie, What are we to do? The mob [masa]
is arriving. The owner, who was in his family house in the same street, claims
he heard the person on the other end of the radio say protect the people. As
for the damage let them. 66

According to the owner, two police cars were parked between
the crowd and bakery. The demonstrators dismantled a brick fence in front of
the house across the street, and used the bricks to smash the bakery windows.67 Several
demonstrators entered into the premises and destroyed the inventory. The camera
installed in the bakery recorded the scene. Human Rights Watch has viewed the
tape. Its quality is diminished because the lights in the bakery were switched
off. Nevertheless, the physiognomy and the movements of the perpetrators can be
discerned, at least enough to complement other leads a proper investigation
might provide. However, as of January 2005, there had been no investigation
into the case.68
As in other similar cases, nobody from the city authorities visited the owner
in the months after the incident.69

On March 21, at around 3 a.m., unknown perpetrators threw a
Molotov cocktail (gasoline bomb) into a bakery on Dusana Vasiljeva Street,
owned by an ethnic Albanian. When the neighbors saw the flames, they called the
fire service, which came and put out the fire. The bakery had been under
construction and had yet to open to the public at the time of the attack. There
were no inscriptions or visual signs on the building to indicate either that it
was a bakery or the owners name.70
The brother of the bakery owner told Human Rights Watch in July 2004 that no
police or political officials have contacted his brother since the March 21
incident.71
There has been no criminal investigation into the incident.72

A few days after the violent incidents, the owners of
Evropa and Vojvodina bakeries requested a meeting with the then-president of
the city government. Their request was denied.73 Owners of Evropa, Aziz, and
Vojvodina also submitted reimbursement claims to the city council, directly
or through the police. The city made a public commitment to compensate owners
for their losses, but have thus far failed to do so.74 (See below, chapter
Failure to Provide Compensation).

During the March events, mobs estimated at several hundreds
of people rampaged among two Novi Sad settlements inhabited by Roma and Ashkali.
Among many of the Roma and Ashkali were displaced persons from Kosovo, who left
the province in 1999 following the withdrawal of Serbian troops; some ethnic
Albanians suspected that Roma and Ashkali had collaborated with the Serb and
Yugoslav forces during the 1999 conflict. In the immediate aftermath of the
1999 conflict, their homes were burned alongside Serb homes, and Roma and
Ashkali communities also faced deadly attacks, kidnappings, and other forms of
violence. On successive nights between March 17 and 19, 2004, large ethnic
Albanian crowds in Kosovo again targeted Roma and Ashkali, along with the
ethnic Serbs who still live in the province.

That Serb violence against ethnic Albanians would extend to
Roma and Ashkali, who themselves had been targeted by the Albanians in Kosovo,
appears irrational on its face. However, for many Serb ultra-nationalists, the
distinctions between Albanians and Roma and Ashkali are less important than the
similarities. Many Albanians and Roma are Muslims, while Serbs typically belong
to the Christian Orthodox Church. Ashkali are Albanian speakers (while Roma
generally speak Romani language). For the ultra-nationalistic mobs, the Roma
from Kosovo, particularly those who speak Albanian, appear to serve as
surrogates for Albanians.

On the night of March 17 or in the early hours of March 18,
the same group that had damaged several bakeries and pastry-shops in the
center, and the Islamic center on Futoski road, continued their way toward the
nearby Adicesettlement, at the southern outskirts. Some 500 Roma and
Ashkali live in this neighborhood, most of them recently displaced from Kosovo.75 The crowd
marching on the neighborhood was estimated at around one thousand people.76 The police
blocked the entrance to Adice at the small bridge separating the settlement
from the adjacent Telep suburb. Demonstrators attacked the police with bricks
and stones, and even tried to penetrate the police cordon with a truck.77 The police
managed to ward off the attackers and arrested some among them. In the
following days, the police and the Roma and Ashkali residents organized night
guards to preempt any new attacks.78

On the night of March 18 or in the early hours of 19, some
500 demonstrators targeted the Veliki rit (Big Marsh) settlement.79 Around 350
Roma families live in Veliki rit,of whom 150 are displaced from Kosovo.
Some thirty Ashkali families, all displaced persons from Kosovo, also live
there.80
The settlement is located four kilometers from the center, across a channel
separating the center from the northern suburbs. The main entrance to the
settlement is located one kilometer from the bridge over the channel, with a
second entrance further up north. On March 18 or in the early hours of March 19,
the police failed to prevent the crowds arrival in the immediate vicinity of
the Roma houses in Veliki rit. The police could have used crowd control
barriers at the bridge over the channel, but took no action, allowing the
demonstrators to reach the entrance to Veliki rit. Television news media were
present during the incident and filmed the event. A Roma resident from the
settlement described what happened:

Several dozens policemen stood on the main road, close to
my house, blocking the entrance into the settlement. When the crowd came,
around 12:30 a.m., the demonstrators threw rocks on the three houses at the
entrance. Then they continued along the main road, to get to the other end of
the settlement, further up north. I learnt afterwards that the demonstrators
broke windows on several houses there. The whole thing lasted until four oclock in the morning. We were afraid what might happen, so we sent the women and
children to the swamps behind the settlement. They spent the whole night there,
thousands of them.81

The Roma resident and a Serb from the neighborhood across
the street from Veliki rit, interviewed separately, both told Human Rights
Watch that the crowd was led by a big van, with a dozen persons on the roof.82 The Roma man
also said that one of the people on the roof of the van was waiving the flag of
the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party.

The Roma resident told Human Rights Watch that the
authorities had taken no action against those responsible for the violence.

Television cameras were recording everything that was
going on, so the police could easily [have] identif[ied] the perpetrators. The
police were also here. So it would be easy to know what exactly happened. But I
am sure that nobody has been punished for the violence. If there are no
punishments, offenders will not hesitate to do the same thing again. We told
the city authorities, if this happens again, all of us will march to the border
and demand resettlement in some other country.83

Human Rights Watch has been unable to obtain information
about possible prosecutions on ordinary criminal charges against any of the
participants, but has confirmed that there have been no investigations or
prosecutions on charges of incitement to ethnic or religious hatred arising out
of the incident.84

On March 18 at around 1 a.m., a crowd of several hundred
people broke windows on the premises of the Islamic center (medzlis) in Novi Sad. The center serves the Muslim community in the city and its surroundings, which
numbers around 20,000. It is located in an ordinary apartment building. There
is no inscription or symbol designating the building as a center for Muslims,
but its location was evidently known to some of those involved in the attack.

Imam Fadil Murati, the supreme Islamic cleric in Vojvodina,
was an eyewitness to the violence on March 18, which he recounted to Human
Rights Watch:

I lived in the backyard at the back of the building. Around
a quarter to one in the morning a friend phoned to warn me that mobs were on
the rampage in Novi Sad. I decided to leave the apartment, to spare other
neighbors trouble if the mobs come here. When I got into the street, I saw a
mass of 400 or 500 people coming from the direction of the towns center. I
crossed the street, because two police cars were parked there. The mob began to
break windows on the adjacent house, where a Chinese shop is located. Then they
broke the windows in our center. The masses shouted Kill Shiptars! Kill
Shiptars! I was dressed in civilian clothes, so nobody recognized me. I wonder
why the police did not prevent the demonstrators from coming here? I did not
identify myself to the police because I wanted to see whether they would do
something to protect the center. But they were only standing by. They did not
even tell the mobs Stop, dont do that!85

The failure of the police to prevent the rampage and, at a
later stage, to identify, arrest and prosecute the perpetrators, was a grave
dereliction of their obligations under international law. The Islamic center is
located two and a half kilometers from the city center on Futoski road. The
police and the Vojvodina Executive Council apparently determined that it was
necessary to allow the mob to damage the center of Novi Sad, so that the police
could concentrate their forces to protect the Roma/Ashkali settlements at Adice
and Veliki Rit.86
This strategy effectively meant that the police did not intervene when rioters
seriously damaged the stores belonging to Albanians and Muslims in the city
center.

Enquiries by Human Rights Watch indicate that, as of late
June 2005, no criminal investigation had been carried out into the damage to
the Islamic center, despite the presence of police cars at the scene when the
attack took place.87

After the first night of riots in Novi Sad, the police
arrested eighteen people, and filed misdemeanor charges for damaging property
against eleven of them. A police communiqué also announced that the police
would file criminal charges against two individuals.88 After the second night,
in which the perpetrators stoned the houses in Veliki rit, the police announced
that they had filed an unspecified number of misdemeanor charges.89 The
spokesperson for the Novi Sad police told the media, that police did not
intervene in order  to avoid undesirable reactions, clashes and disorder on a
bigger scale. We make a record of the rioters and identify them, and
subsequently we file criminal charges against some of them.90 Given the repeated life-
and property-threatening acts by the rioters, it is extraordinary that the
police rejected the use of appropriate force to prevent violence, suggesting
instead that it was sufficient to let the violence run its course and later
bring prosecutions. Even on that score, progress has been limited. In the
fifteen months after the riots, there have been no serious investigations and
no prosecutions on charges of incitement to ethnic or religious hatred. The
district prosecutor in Novi Sad did not receive any criminal charges, against
the perpetrators and supporting evidence, from Novi Sad police.91

Human Rights Watch is concerned that, encouraged by the
police failure to protect and the governments failure to fully prosecute those
responsible for the March 2004 riots, Serb ultra-nationalists might again
strike at ethnic Albanians, Muslims, Roma, and Ashkali in the event of further
unrest in Kosovo. It is an imperative that the Serbian government ensure that
those responsible for the March 2004 violence be adequately punished, and
prevent any repetition of similar riots in the future.

The property owners in Novi Sad have been unable to get
reimbursement for the repair of damaged properties, despite an expressed commitment
by the city administration to compensate owners for the damage to their
property. In the aftermath of the violence on March 17 and 18, 2004, Executive
Council of the Novi Sad Assembly invited the owners to submit claims for
reimbursement.92
According to a former aide to the mayor, several owners whose property had been
damaged duly submitted claims.93

The then-administration, a broad coalition of parties from
the center of political spectrum, remained in power until September 2004, when
the ultra-nationalistic Serbian Radical Party won local elections. Between
March and September, the earlier administration declined to deliver on the
promise it made. In mid-January 2005, when Human Rights Watch inquired with the
new administration about the fate of the reimbursement claims, the officials
and civil servants said they did not know anything about the issue. On February
3, 2005, the Office of the City Mayor informed Human Rights Watch that the
Executive Council had not reimbursed any claimants.94

[40]
For a detailed account of the March 2004 events in Kosovo see Human Rights
Watch, Failure to Protect: Anti-Minority Violence in Kosovo, March 2004, July
2004, Vol. 16, No 6 (D).

[41]
Zapaljena dzamija u centru Nisa (Mosque in the Center of Nis Set on Fire),
B92 web site, March 17, 2004 [online], http://www.b92.net/info/vesti/index.php?yyyy=2004&mm=03&dd=17&nav_id=135524&nav_category=11
(retrieved July 6, 2005); see also Pojacane mere bezbednosti vitalnih objekata
u gradu (Measures To Protect Key Objects in the City Strengthened), Danas,
March 19, 2004 [online], http://www.danas.co.yu/20040319/dogadjajdana1.html#2
(retrieved July 6, 2005). Shiptar is a derogatory term used by Serb
nationalists to describe ethnic Albanians. Most Albanians in Kosovo and in Serbia are Muslims.

[52]
Belgrade newspaper Blic reconstructed the chronology of the police
actions based on the transcripts of telephone conversations between the Serbian
Minister of Justice and the head of Belgrade police. Exceprts from the
transcripts were published in Blic on June 8, 2005, in an article entitled Dzamija gori, Jocic se ceslja (Mosque in Flame, [Minister] Jocic is
Combing His Hair) [online], http://www.blic.co.yu/arhiva/2005-06-08/strane/tema.htm.

[55]
Human Rights Watch interview with Mufti Hamdija Jusufspahic, Belgrade, June 1,
2005. The City Bureau for Damage Assessment established that the damage
inflicted on the buildings of the mosque and the Islamic Community in Belgrade amounted to 130 million dinars (US$2.34 million at the time of the incident). The
figure does not include the value of the objects destroyed in the flame in the
buildings.

[56]
Human Rights Watch interview with Goran Ilic, head of Office of the First
Municipal Public Prosecutor in Belgrade, Belgrade, July 7, 2005.

[57]
Policija: nismo ocekivali da mogu da zapale dzamiju (Police: We Did Not
Expect That They Might Set the Mosque on Fire), B92 web site [online], March 18, 2004, http://www.b92.net/info/vesti/index.php?yyyy=2004&mm=03&dd=18&nav_id=135595&nav_category=11
(retrieved July 6, 2005) (statement by Milan Obradovic, then-head of the
Belgrade police); Simic: Prijave protiv 36 lice (Simic: Charges Against 36
Persons), B92 web site [online], http://www.b92.net/info/vesti/index.php?yyyy=2004&mm=11&dd=15&nav_id=155824&nav_category=12,
November 15, 2004 (retrieved July 6, 2005) (quoting Milan Simic, head of the Belgrade police, in his expose to the Serbian parliament on November 15, 2004).

[60]
Human Rights Watch interview with Violeta Jovanovic, deputy president of the
First Municipal Court in Belgrade, Belgrade, June 10, 2005. As the minimum
penalty proscribed under Article 230 of the Penal Code, the three-month
imprisonment for Gajic may appear excessively lenient. On the other hand, the
accused belongs to the category of so-called junior adult persons (between 18
and 21 years of age) who often receive suspended sentences or, as in Gajics
case, unconditional but mild sentences. It appears therefore that the trial
chamber in this case simply followed the usual sentencing policy.

[61]
Human Rights Watch interview with Goran Ilic, head of Office of the First
Municipal Public Prosecutor in Belgrade, Belgrade, July 7, 2005.

[64]
Gorani are a Slavic Muslim ethnic group. The majority live in the Gora region
in Kosovo. They are distinct from the other Muslim Slav community in the former
Yugoslavia, the Bosniaks. The group does not appear on the Serbian government
website list of the ten principal minorities in Vojvodina. Elsewhere in Serbia, not including Kosovo, 3,975 persons declared themselves Gorani at the 2002 census. See
Facts about Serbia: National Minorities, Serbian government website,
http://www.arhiva.serbia.sr.gov.yu/cms/view.php?id=1016 (retrieved July 30,
2005).

[65]
Human Rights Watch interview with F.K., Novi Sad, July 16, 2004. As of January
2005, there has been no criminal investigation into the case. Human Rights
Watch telephone interview with Novi Sad Municipal Public Prosecutor Obrad
Protic, January 27, 2005.

[74]
On March 18, 2004, the Executive Council of Novi Sad Assembly decided that it
would consider all individual requests by property owners for reimbursement of
repair expenses. Four store owners, as well as a Hungarian theater in Novi Sad (Ujvideki Ssinhaz), eventually submitted reimbursement claims. However, since July
2004 the Executive Council has not acted upon the claims. Written communication
by the Office the Mayor of Novi Sad to Human Rights Watch, February 3, 2005.

[75]
Milorad Bojovic, Nocne straze posle pozara na Kosovu (Night Guards After the
Eruption in Kosovo), Danas (Belgrade), March 26, 2004 [online],
http://www.danas.co.yu/20040326/terazije1.html#4 (retrieved January 31, 2005)
(the article quotes mesna zajednica  the administrative body in the
local community  as the source for this figure).

[86]
See Center for Development of Civil Society, Etnicki incidenti u Vojvodini
posle internacionalizacije (Ethnic Incidents in Vojvodina After the
Internationalization), January 2005 [online], http://www.cdcs.org.yu/docs/internat_engl.doc.
The author of the report is current advisor to the president of Vojvodina
Assembly.